we already hit the debt ceiling that isn't commonly realized. the question do you want to draw a line there and mess around with a market reaction or draw a line on funding the government? if you're not going to fund the government our option is to shut down the government. if you want to resort to drastic measures talk about a threat to shut down the government, not a threat to default on america's debt. that is interesting choice republicans will talk about over the next few days. the white house would prefer to have none of the above. tracy: right. >> if you're going to use leverage, which is the smartest leverage to use. tracy: talk about that. is it legal for treasury to prioritize its bills basically? regardless what happens, we're probably still going to make our interest payments aren't we? >> that is kind of the argument that emerged in the last couple days. republicans are saying look there is no threat of default here. if we hit the debt ceiling it means the government can only spend as much revenue coming in on any given day. you can